Tag Archives: murder

The Mauritius Robbery Affair: Another Shot

Port Louis

Port Louis, Mauritius – Found at Mauritius Life

Chapter Eight: Another Shot

“He gave up his two mates so we should have this case tied up fairly soon, Ian.”

Police Lieutenant Winston Permalloo on the island of Mauritius where this whole mess began had finally gotten a break. A DNA sample of one of the four robbers who had been in Krista Bernham’s flat the night she was assassinated was matched up with a petty thief named Cassam Denmamode who was subsequently arrested in the aftermath of yet another heist. His attorney suggested he might be better off turning over his two accomplices rather facing a murder rap alone.

“What did he say about the fourth man, Winston?” Ian didn’t need to speak louder just because it was an international call, but decades of habit were difficult to break.

“Their boss, though Denmamode doesn’t know much about him. He planned all their jobs, emailed them their instructions for the robberies, and in addition to what they got for each haul, wired additional funds for them into an offshore account. The three we have here are small timers, but whoever put them up to this was a stone cold professional.”

“Qian.”

“Quite, Ian. It seems clear that the robberies were just a front for the real objective, the assassination of Ms. Bernham. Once that had been accomplished, the fourth man disappeared again and he stopped sending them any further crime plans.”

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The Mauritius Robbery Affair: God Rolled the Dice

north korean train depot

Chapter Seven: God Rolled the Dice

Four Months ago – Pyongyang, North Korea

Jun Ho was only six-years old and this was his first train ride. Daddy couldn’t come, but Mommy said they were going all the way to Russia.

Soo Mi took her only child by his hand as the train pulled into Pyongyang station. It would take eight days to reach Moscow and anything could go wrong in that time. She showed the forged identity papers to the conductor. It was unlikely her husband would suspect they’d attempt to escape this way.

Her son was so excited as they took their seats. He giggled when the train started moving. They would never see North Korea again. Her long assignment as a sleeper agent was over. She was taking her precious boy and North Korea’s astonishing nuclear secrets back to the west with her.

Her husband, a Major in the Korean People’s Army, would search for them in vain, or so she prayed. If they were caught before reaching safety, given what she knew, both Soo Mi and her little boy would be killed immediately. The North Korean military couldn’t risk the information getting out in the open. That’s why it was so important for Jun Ho and her to reach home.

Today – London

In 1963, a John le Carré novel was published called The Spy Who Came in from the Cold and later made into a movie starring Richard Burton. The novel had not been on Krista Bernham’s book shelf and the only reason Ian Dennis thought of it was the messages that flashed on his computer screen. He had sent out a coded query that anything having to with North Korea, nuclear weapons, high level assassinations, Kim Jong-um, and related topics trigger an alert that would be routed to him. Since this was, for the most part, internal information, he wasn’t fed details, but he was given a contact so he could further inquire.

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The Mauritius Robbery Affair: Messenger

nicosia1

© Dickelbers/Wikimedia Commons

Chapter Six: Messenger

Ian Dennis flew into Larnaca International Airport on Cyprus, but he had another airport in mind.

In 1974, Turkey invaded Cyprus and the Nicosia International Airport, once the island’s principal air hub, was the site of extremely violent encounters between Turkish and Cypriot forces and was heavily bombed. Today, it is deserted, officially closed and, located within the UN controlled buffer zone, has been declared a Protected Area used as the headquarters of the UN peacekeeping force.

Fortunately, Ian has a few connections at the UN and in Cyprus security so he arranged for a private visit. He had a meeting this morning with her.

She stepped out from behind a security wall at what was once the Health Control centre.

“I see you continue to abide by the rules of British punctuality, Ian.”

“And you remain mysterious as ever.” He indicated a direction by waving his right arm and she joined him on an uncharacteristically casual stroll through the ruins.

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The Mauritius Robbery Affair: The Woman is Deadly

Chapter Five: The Woman is Deadly

“Phillip is at football practice, but Marcie and Roger are right here, Ian.”

It was good to hear Evie’s voice again. They’d divorced not because they lost their love for each other, but because of the stresses of his career. Even if he’d have quit MI6, his history with the agency was such that he’d always attract the “interest” of certain parties. He’d never be completely safe, and as long as he lived with his family, they’d never be safe either.

“It’s okay, Evie. I’d love to talk with them.”

“Here. Let me put you on speaker.” Then in the background Ian heard her say, “It’s Daddy calling.” He could hear Marcie and Roger squeal.

“Daddy, Daddy, how are you? When are you coming to visit?” Little Roger was all of five and always full of enthusiasm. He didn’t recall a time when Ian actually lived at home or the family living in London at all.

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The Mauritius Robbery Affair: Patterns

Port Louis

Port Louis, Mauritius – Found at Mauritius Life

Chapter Four: Patterns

In spite of Ian Dennis’s determination to keep working, he found his brain too clouded to concentrate on even the idea of addressing Krista Bernham’s work. Krista was a brilliant researcher with the unique gift of taking data which seemed absolutely unrelated and finding patterns that even the most complex computer algorithm might not associate.

After her divorce from Malcolm Bernham, she moved with her son Ian from their home in Edinburgh to the island of Mauritius. Frankly, she could work from anywhere with internet access that could be secured by her employer, but her grandmother was originally from the island and she found she wanted to go “home.” Krista recalled visiting “old Gran” many times as a child and loving the beauty, the serenity, and even the profound loneliness of living on a tiny bit of land surrounded by thousands of kilometers of ocean.

She thought raising her only child here might give him a better life than in the UK. That might have been true for many other mothers of many other sons, but not for Krista Bernham. She had been set up on Mauritius with a cover identity by the British Secret Intelligence Service, provided with very expensive, highly secure hardware and software with which to work, and for the past five years, had broken some of the most profound and delicate intelligence cases for SIS.

Now she was dead. The only witness to the murder, her eleven-year-old autistic child Ian, a boy the MI6 agent had befriended and then further traumatized for the sake of his investigation.

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The Mauritius Robbery Affair: Tattoo

assassin's tattoo

Assassin’s Creed tattoo

Chapter Three: Tattoo

In the hospital parking lot, MI6 agent Ian Dennis was standing by the undercover police car and rapidly thumbing through photos related to the Krista Bernham murder case. “I know I saw it. I know I…oh yes, here it is.” He looked up at Winston Permalloo, his liasion with the Mauritius police force. “Don’t you have a better photo of them than this?”

He held up a photo taken by a security camera on the street outside Ms. Bernham’s home that momentarily captured her four alleged assailants.

“Well, not on hand. We have the original stills taken from the security tape, plus the tape itself back at headquarters.”

Dennis immediately got into the passenger seat and shut his door, then called out the open driver’s side door. “Let’s go, Winston. I need to be sure of what I saw. This photo is too grainy.”

Lt. Permalloo got into the car and slammed the door. He liked Ian, but the agent was getting on his nerves. As he fired up the motor, he asked, “What are you looking for?”

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The Mauritius Robbery Affair: Ian

boy in hospital

Found at BabyCenter.com

Chapter Two: Ian

“Good morning, lad.” Dennis peeked around the corner of the door so as not to startle the boy. He saw young Ian had been working on a sketch pad, probably the one that Winston mentioned. “Mind if I visit you for a bit?”

The eleven-year-old eyed him suspiciously. His sandy blond hair looked disheveled but his blue eyes were red but otherwise clear. He’d been crying. He was sitting up in the hospital bed, covered to the waist with blankets and dressed one of those awful patient gowns that opened in the back.

“You a doctor?”

The older Ian stepped into the room and let the door close behind him. “No. I used to know your Mum. Came to see how you were doing.”

The child seemed to brighten for a second that it was a friend and not a doctor or the police come to question him, but then he closed up again. “Don’t remember you. Who are you?”

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The Mauritius Robbery Affair: Arrival

airport

Sir Seewoosagur Ramgoolam International Airport – Mauritius

Chapter One: Arrival

Ian Dennis hated long flights, not because he didn’t like to travel but because he could never sleep while in transit. He was here to work and jet lag would get in the way. True, there was only a three-hour time difference between London and Mauritius, but the flight was nearly twelve hours long. Fortunately, he’d been able to get a direct route from Heathrow, otherwise he might not have gotten here for another twelve.

Everyone who saw him arriving at Sir Seewoosagur Ramgoolam International Airport supposed Dennis was just another British tourist on holiday. Only a few police officials knew the MI6 agent was here to investigate the murder of an accountant from Scotland and the brutalization of her autistic son. The recent string of robberies was unusual for a small island but he suspected and feared this might not be a robbery.

“G’morning, Dennis. Good flight?” He and Winston Permalloo shook hands. They’d met on several previous occasions and Ian liked the younger man who currently was a lieutenant on the local force which handled police, security and military functions on the island. His superiors knew Permalloo to be the only covert agent native to Mauritius, but what few of them suspected that he was also an MI6 double-agent.

“Bloody didn’t sleep a wink as usual. Thanks for the pick-up, Permalloo. Everything set up?”

“As well as could be, Dennis. We can talk more once we get to my car.”

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The Lady is Murder

pink

© Grant-Sud

The medina attracted many tourists to Marrakech, but it was also easy to disappear here. Rabah Hadad was born and raised in London’s West Hampstead, his father a banker and his mother a teacher, but he had become something else.

He stopped in a small alleyway, the wall painted a garish fuchsia. In October, the notice about heat exhaustion, heat stroke, and such seemed ludicrous. He was only twenty-four and recruited by MI6 right out of Uni. Tonight he was in this Moroccan city to help solve the murder of an SIS data analyst who had died over 9,000 kilometers away on Mauritius. It was after eleven and it was quiet. Where was the contact?

medina

An alley in the Medina in Marrakech – Found at Conde Nast Traveler

Footsteps from behind distracted Rabah. He didn’t notice the door to his right silently open. Then the two muffled shots and twin impacts on his chest. He looked down to witness blood seeping through his dark t-shirt. As he collapsed, the last thing he saw was the silencer and a beautiful woman holding the gun that killed him.

I wrote this for the FFfAW Challenge for the Week of October 17, 2017. The idea is to use the image above as an inspiration for crafting a piece of flash fiction between 100 and 175 words long. My word count is 172.

I leveraged a previous piece of flash fiction called Mauritius Intrigue that I authored a few days ago. Having nothing to go on when I started writing, I magnified the image above and saw the notice warned of the signs of heat related disorders. Since I also recently wrote a story set in Marrakech (albeit some 80 or so years ago), I decided to “recycle” the location.

Of course all this adds another mystery. What does the death of a young MI6 agent in Marrakech have to do with the murder of a middle-aged data analyst and mother of a son over nine thousand kilometers away on the other side of the African continent in the middle of the Indian Ocean?

I’ll let you know when I find out, including the identity of the mysterious women who pulled the trigger.

To read other stories based on the prompt, go to InLinkz.com.

Mauritius Intrigue

airport

Sir Seewoosagur Ramgoolam International Airport – Mauritius

Everyone at Sir Seewoosagur Ramgoolam International Airport supposed Ian Dennis was another British tourist on holiday. Only a few police officials knew the MI6 agent was there to investigate the murder of an accountant from Scotland and the brutalization of her child. The recent string of robberies was unusual for a small island, but this was no robbery.

“G’morning, Dennis. Good flight?” Winston Permalloo shook hands. Supposed casual chauffeur, he was actually a lieutenant on the Police Force, which handled security and military functions. Permalloo was the only covert agent native to Mauritius and an MI6 double-agent.

“Bloody didn’t sleep a wink. Thanks for the pick-up, Permalloo.”

Dennis’s bags retrieved, they arrived at the car.

“All secure. We’re free to talk, Dennis.”

“Just how the hell did enemy agents assassinate a top SIS data analyst who had the perfect cover?”

“That’s what you’re here to help me find out, Ian.”

I wrote this for the What Pegman Saw writing challenge. The idea is to take a location and Google street maps image and use them as the prompt for writing a piece of flash fiction no more than 150 words long. My word count is 150.

Today, the Pegman takes us to the island of Mauritius which is in the Indian Ocean off the east coast of Africa. The island has a fascinating history and culture and would certainly be worthy of a vacation visit someday.

Doing my research, I discovered that last July, the murder of a 47-year-old woman was reported. The act was supposedly to have been committed by robbers and witnessed by the victim’s ten-year-old autistic son.

I used that as the jumping off point for my small story. It does seem strange that on such a small piece of real estate, it would be possible to commit what amounts to a crime spree and not be detected after very long.

To read other stories based on the prompt, go to InLinkz.com.

The mystery continues in The Lady is Murder.

I’ve expanded the original stories into a small series. The first chapter is called The Mauritius Robbery Affair: Arrival.